


fixing the broken pieces

by butterflysky



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Mentions of canon character death, Post-Infinity War, Sort Of, and just general post-snap chaos/death, most characters are just mentioned apart from nat and sharon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-06 12:31:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15194843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butterflysky/pseuds/butterflysky
Summary: Three weeks after the snap, Natasha meets with Sharon Carter.(Natasha hasn't seen Sharon for a long time. She has an apology to make, and a mess to fix.)





	fixing the broken pieces

Three weeks after the snap, Natasha meets with Sharon Carter. 

It’s a low-key affair; they meet at the coffee shop on the corner of Sharon’s block, Natasha wearing a baseball cap and oversized sunglasses, because she doesn’t think she could handle being recognised right then, and Sharon just in jeans and a t-shirt, blonde hair loose on her shoulders.

“Nat,” Sharon says, her voice steady. “It’s been a while.”

It has. There were the Accords, and then there was Thanos, and now…

“You’re blonde now,” Sharon says, and Natasha tugs self-consciously at the strand of hair poking out from underneath her hat.

“Red was too eye-catching.”

“I see,” Sharon says.

( _Natasha, hands fumbling on her phone, dredging up Sharon’s name from her contacts list, hitting call, holding her breath, letting it out in a sob when Sharon_ ** _answers_** _and whispering “I just wanted to hear your voice. I just wanted to check you…”_ ** _were still alive_**.)

They sit in a booth away from the window. Natasha orders her coffee black — it’s sharp and bitter on her tongue, keeps her grounded when her mind tries to drift away from her.

“How are you? All of you?” Sharon asks, quietly, and Natasha drinks long from her mug and avoids Sharon’s eyes.

“Not doing well,” Natasha says. Her and Steve had searched for Sam for hours. They’d kept going long after they’d realised they’d never find him. 

“I can imagine,” Sharon says. 

“What about you?” Natasha asks. She already knows Fury and Maria Hill are gone — her calls had gone to voicemail, and then they’d stopped connecting at all.

Sharon shrugs. She looks exhausted, dark shadows smudged under her eyes, the corners of her mouth twisted down. Now _she’s_ avoiding Natasha’s eyes as she says, “The same.”

After the snap, there’d been chaos. Planes fell from the sky. Cars piled up. People ran from nothing, screaming, crying, as the TVs and radios went to static and anyone with a modicum of power scrambled to figure out what the hell had just happened. Natasha had missed most of it, as she scoured the Wakandan soil for what was left of her friends.

“Are you…is there…” Sharon stopped, sipped her drink. “Is there anything you can do?”

“They’re on it,” Natasha says, and it’s true — Scott, Bruce and Tony are holed up in a lab somewhere as they speak. Thor and Rhodey are probably with them, too — and Nebula, that strange, livewire of a woman with a steel gaze and a jaw permanently clenched. Natasha had liked her immediately, had wished they’d met under different circumstances. Clint was still with his family, but ready to jump in as soon as they had a plan. Natasha’s not really sure about the racoon, but he seems to be with them.

And Steve…well, she doesn’t like to leave him alone, not when she can see his loneliness choking him. But he likes to be alone. He likes to sit and stare at nothing in particular, and Natasha can do nothing but sit beside him and press their shoulders together so he can’t ignore that she’s there with him. (He’d spoken to her, once, when he was sitting and staring: _I didn’t think I’d have to lose so many people again._ )

“What do you think?” Sharon says, and gives her that shrewd look Natasha had grown used to, once. The look that sees through all her bullshit.

“I think there’s no way,” Natasha says, honestly. “There’s no way to fix this.”

Sharon drops her eyes and drinks her coffee.

 

 

The Accords are dropped _temporarily,_ according to Ross, to allow her and Steve to work freely for as long as it takes to clean up this catastrophic mess. Natasha meets his gaze head on when it falls on her, secure in the knowledge that he _needs_ them, now, and lets herself smile just slightly when he looks infuriated.

Steve watches Ross silently, arms folded, but he doesn’t look away when Ross looks at him, until Ross lowers his eyes first.

“There’s no time for this,” Thor says, waving away Ross’s hologram. “If we are to locate the Time Stone—”

“We _can’t,_ Thanos has it,” Tony snaps. “And we have no idea where he is.”

“We can find him,” Nebula says, quiet. “ _I_ can find him.”

They don’t have time for bickering, either — if they ever did — and Natasha finds it getting under her skin to the point that she gets up and steps outside, into the cool air. Storm clouds are gathering overhead. Natasha wonders if it’s something to do with Thor’s frustration.

She feels her phone buzz in her pocket; Sharon. Natasha very carefully avoids looking at the last message in the conversation, dated two years ago.

_hope ross wasn’t too much of an asshole._

Natasha feels the corner of her mouth quirk up. _he always is, but i’ve handled worse_

_i know you have._ Sharon’s typing bubble pops up, disappears, pops up, disappears. Natasha waits.

_there’s a new italian in my neighbourhood. we could catch up. if you want._

Natasha hesitates. She _wants_ to reply yes, but she remembers what it’d felt like, last time, to go dark on Sharon and disappear. If she has to do that again, she’s not sure she wants to make it hurt any worse than it has to, and reminding herself what Sharon’s smile looks like, laugh sounds like, ( _mouth tastes like_ ), would only make it cut deeper when she has to vanish.

_i know you’re busy._ Sharon sends, when Natasha has waited too long to answer. _don’t worry about it._

_no,_ Natasha types, before she’s really sure what she’s going to say. _i’m not too busy for italian. tomorrow night?_

 

 

Sharon’s wearing a dress Natasha has never seen before. For some reason, it tugs at something in her chest. They’d never been _together_ together, but they’d been…something. Enough that Natasha had seen all her date outfits (she didn’t have many — _she_ was busy too, after all). 

“You look nice,” Natasha says, kind of pathetically, and Sharon gives her that shrewd look again.

“Thank you,” she says, politely, and sits down.

Natasha’s wearing a dress she’s worn on a mission before. She suddenly wishes she’d worn something more authentic, although that doesn’t even make sense to her.

They order their food, and then they talk.

Sharon tells Natasha what she’s done in the time since the Accords: climbed the ranks of the CIA, adopted a kitten from a shelter, started an indoor garden of succulents in her apartment, visited Peggy’s grave and made sure the flowers were always fresh, joined a dance class for something to do in the evening.

Natasha tells Sharon about tracking and taking out the remaining Hydra bases with Sam and Steve, giving Wanda relationship advice, visiting Bucky on his farm once he’d woken up, sparring with the Dora Milaje, the time Sam had taking her out flying, that Bucky had named a goat after her and that it’d been weirdly touching rather than insulting.

She talks about them all in the present tense, she realises once she’s done, but Sharon doesn’t correct her. 

“Sounds nice,” Sharon says.

“I should’ve called you,” Natasha says, and Sharon’s eyes snap up from her plate. “I’m sorry. I was just…scared.”

“Of what?” Sharon asks, her food forgotten, now.

“I knew I’d hurt you,” Natasha says, and it’s excruciating, laying herself open like this, but if anyone deserves all of her, it’s Sharon. “Just disappearing like that. I didn’t want to face it, and I told myself it might…hurt _you_ less, if I never contacted you again. But I was being selfish.”

Sharon sighs, quietly, and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. Natasha recognises the gesture — it’s a nervous tic, something for Sharon to do with her hands while she thinks.

“You did hurt me,” Sharon says, and Natasha winces. She knows she deserves it. “I understand why you had to go. I didn’t understand why you never called.”

_Didn’t._ Not _don’t._ “I’m sorry,” Natasha says, again.

“I know you are,” Sharon sighs. “But when the…when it _happened,_ when I saw people turn to dust, I thought…I was so scared that you—” She breaks off, shakes her head. “And then you finally called.”

Natasha can’t look her in the eye.

“But it’s fine,” Sharon says, and sighs. “I don’t—I don’t want to waste anymore time. Not when people can disintegrate in an instant.”

Natasha looks up. “You—?”

“I’m saying, I don’t want to be angry anymore,” Sharon says, and shrugs. “You’re here. You’re not a pile of ash. And neither am I. That seems the most important thing, now.”

“I don’t deserve you,” Natasha says, and Sharon smiles, just a bit.

 

 

 A week later, Sharon invites Natasha round to her apartment for takeout. It’s so _normal,_ when she’s spent the day sitting in the Avengers compound trying to figure out a way to find Thanos, that she feels almost dizzy with the relief of being able to _forget_ for a little while. 

“You still like Chinese, right?” Sharon says, instead of hello, when she opens her door.

“Of course,” Natasha says. She heads to the kitchen and pops open a takeout box — it’s the same dish she always orders, which means Sharon remembered. Natasha feels another tug in her chest.

“Good,” Sharon says.

“Is this your succulent garden?” Natasha asks, running her finger over a waxy green leaf. There _are_ a lot of succulents, spread across a network of bookshelves, all in pastel coloured pots. It’s adorable.

“Yes,” Sharon says. “They’re my pride and joy.”

“And your kitten?” Natasha asks. “I want to snuggle.”

“She’s napping,” Sharon says. “Don’t you dare wake her up.”

Natasha finds the cat curled up asleep by the TV. She’s white with a pale blue collar, and almost unbearably fluffy. Natasha just about refrains from stroking her, and calls over to Sharon, “What’s her name?”

“Um,” Sharon says, and Natasha looks up, expectant. “She’s called Fluffy. Don’t laugh.”

“ _Fluffy,_ ” Natasha says.

“Don’t laugh!” Sharon says, plaintive, and Natasha can’t help it — she cracks up.

“Well,” she says. “It’s accurate.”

“Not another word,” Sharon says, as she finishes plating up the takeout. “It was the best I could think of.”

“It’s a great name,” Natasha says, and hops onto a stool at the kitchen island. “I love it.”

“Good,” Sharon says. “That’s what I want to hear.”

They eat, and they don’t talk about anything even slightly associated with either of their jobs. It doesn’t leave a lot of topics, since the only thing that’s been on the news since the snap is, well, the snap, but they manage just fine. Sharon chats about her dance class, and Natasha remembers what she’d said: _for something to do in the evening._

“You’re wasted in the CIA,” Natasha says, and Sharon stops eating.

“Are you offering me a job?” she says, but she’s laughing. 

“If you want,” Natasha says, and Sharon’s smile falters. “We could use someone like you.”

“Sharon Carter, Avenger,” Sharon’s smile is wry. “Never imagined that.”

“Why not?” Natasha says. “You’ve got the skillset.”

Sharon looks like she’s considering it. “But I can’t just _quit._ ”

“Why not?” Natasha says. “The Avengers need you. Matter of life or death, for the _entire universe_. The CIA would understand.”

Sharon smiles at her. “I’ll think about it.”

 

 

Natasha insists on washing up, since Sharon paid, and since she remembers how much Sharon hates doing the dishes. Sharon puts up only a token resistance, and when Natasha glances over at her, she’s curled up on the sofa, wine glass and book in hand. 

“I guess I should head off,” Natasha says, when she’s finished with the dishes.

Sharon looks up from her book, a crease between her eyebrows.

“The Avengers start early,” Natasha says, as an excuse. What she doesn’t say is: _I want to stay, but I don’t know if you want me to._

“Oh,” Sharon says. “You’re not really selling it to me.”

Natasha shrugs. “It’s usually more fun.”

Sharon’s smile is soft. “You sound like you’re going stir crazy in that compound.”

“I am,” Natasha says. “I even _live_ there. I can’t escape.”

“Well,” Sharon says, lightly. “You could stay here tonight.”

Natasha’s breath stops in her throat. “Is that so?”

Sharon nods, but she looks self-conscious, now. “If you want to. No pressure.”

Natasha swallows, and sees Sharon watch the movement. “I—”

Sharon stands, sets her wineglass on the side table, and walks toward her. Natasha waits.

“I told you,” Sharon says, barely above a whisper, when she’s close enough. She reaches up to Natasha’s face, brushes her hand across her cheek, moves her hair back from her face. “All that matters is that you’re here, and I’m here.”

Natasha swallows again, then moves forward and brings her lips to Sharon’s, winds a hand round her waist. Sharon feels soft and warm against her, a steady, comforting presence, and she sighs gently into Natasha’s mouth. Her hands come up to Natasha’s shoulders.

Natasha loses track of how long they stand like that, kissing soft and slow, reacquainting themselves with each other. One of Sharon’s hands starts playing with her hair, and Natasha shivers, pulls Sharon in closer, kisses her deeper.

Sharon pulls back, cheeks a light pink, and says, “Stay?”

“Yes,” Natasha murmurs, and kisses her again.

 

 

Natasha wakes the next morning with her nose in Sharon’s hair; she smells faintly of vanilla. 

She has one arm draped over Sharon’s waist, their legs tangled together, and although she can tell from the sun streaming in through the blinds that she’s _very_ late for the Avengers meeting, she can’t find it in herself to care. For just a moment, she can forget everything except for the way the sun lights Sharon’s hair gold.

It doesn’t last forever; Sharon wakes up, yawns, rolls over and presses her face into Natasha’s neck and says, “I think we’re late for work.”

“I don’t care,” Natasha says.

“I can’t make a bad impression on my first day,” Sharon mumbles, and Natasha goes still.

Sharon pulls back far enough to look at her.

“You really—” Natasha starts, and Sharon smiles.

“Yes,” she says, and Natasha finds herself smiling back.

 

 

Nobody seems that fussed that she’s late, or that she’s brought along a new recruit. Steve looks unbearably happy to see them both, though, and it makes something in Natasha ache. 

“Hello Steve,” Sharon says quietly, as she slides into the chair beside him. Natasha sits next to her.

“Hey, Sharon,” he says, and smiles a very small, very tentative smile.

“We’ve hit a breakthrough,” Tony announces, and Natasha turns all her attention to the front of the room.

“We have?” she says.

“We have,” Tony nods. “We’re going back in time.”

He explains, and Natasha listens, and in the back of her mind, she thinks she might be feeling _hope_ for the first time in a long time. 

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed!! this pairing is too rare tbh
> 
> as always, comments + kudos are very appreciated!!!


End file.
